Useful Thoughts

In my experience this error code occurs when Messenger tries to connect when a Wireless network is inactive. Since msn is stupid, it assumes that rather than the internet not being available, it thinks the service is down, and refuses to connect.

In a further example of stupidity, MSN will continue to report the error even when the network is reconnected and working perfectly. It continues to retardedly assume that the network is down.

The solution is easy albeit annoying - close and restart messager and shock, it then decides to start working. Can't believe that in 2010 an application can't differentiate between no connection available and service down, and then be unable to clear that assumption until the application is restarted. Ugggh!

I've spent ages looking for a 'perfect' savegame for the PC on FF8, but it's harder to find than you'd think. The vast majority of results are for a console version of the game (that will remain nameless to help with searches to this page).

So DOWNLOAD the savegame here if that's all you're looking for. Plonk the file in your slot1/slot2 folder within the 'save' directory of your FF8 installation.

Some notes about what this save is:

• It is not my savegame, I didn't make it. I just found it and I'm reproducing it here with some useful information about it.
• All stats for all characters are maxed out, as in Str, Spr, Mag, Luck, etc. are all at 255 or otherwise junctioned with the strongest possible magic available for that stat. The only stat that is missing are for those GFs which do not have a Hit-J ability - I don't believe this can be learned so it only exists for the GFs that have it by default.
• All characters have a GF junctioned which allows junctioning for all magic, all status and elemental attacks, plus elemental defense x 4 for all.
• The save has max gil (99999999999).
• The character has a ridiculous number of items. Looking at the items it looks like a heavily editted save file as every unique item possible appears in the list, including things like 99 Rosetta stones and other things which are impossible to retain during the course of the game. Also included are things that can only be obtained via Chocobo world and other things you could only ever get on that Japanese handheld version of the mini-game.
• This save loads at DISC 3 on the ESTHAR PLAINS directly before entering Lunatic Pandora for the last time. In other words this is the last point in the game where you still have access to the whole world without restrictions. If you fly into Lunatic Pandora from here, you are then bound into the plot which continues into Disc 4 and the time-compressed world.
• The characters themselves are only at Level 60 or so, although this is somewhat irrelevant as all stats are already maxed, so levelling up further gives no benefit.
• This game is imperfect as the player does not have a full complement of cards. Many decent cards are included but many are missing. Several of the cards could no doubt be obtained from the CC Group which are on the Ragnarok by this point, but that would be something you'd need to do yourself.
• Please feel free to redistribute (but not hotlink) this save - it isn't mine, I have no rights to it, I'm just trying to be helpful.
• If you can 'improve' on this game, either by adding the rare cards, topping up all the items to a quantity of 100, or otherwise put it in a state that is markedly better than it is now, please send me a copy and I'll update the version contained here, and give you a credit.

DOWNLOAD the savegame here

If you're getting this error on an HP Officejet 6310 or another of Hewlett Packard's 'All-in-one' series of printers, then I have some bad news for you.

Your printer is broken, perhaps irrecoverably. HP cartridges have expiry dates on them (check yours) after which the printer will not accept the cartridge for use. The error appears to relate to this 'feature', except it is erroneous because the carts are still very much in date. It looks like a hardware error that makes it think that all carts are invalid. I first experienced this error about 6 months after buying the printer, and dilligently followed the instructions and replaced the right-hand cartridge (the black one). Imagine my annoyance when the error remained, because HP cartridges aren't cheap.

Officejet 6310 All-in-one

I rang HP technical support, and after trying a few obvious troubleshooting measures, they agreed to replace the unit under warranty. A new unit arrived, I gave the old one back, put my old cartridge into it and everything was fine.

Then, a year later, the same error pops up on my replacement unit. Again I ring HP tech support, again we can't fix it, and again they agree to send out a replacement.

Obviously there is something fundamentally wrong with the HP All-in-one series, as I've seen this error reported for a variety of models. In fairness to HP, their tech support responds quickly and are generally happy to replace the unit without too many questions about when you bought it. If you tell them it's still under warranty, you'll be ok. I personally assert that since this isn't a wear and tear failure, but some design flaw that eventually appears regardless of how much you use it, then they're honour-bound to replace it regardless of whether it's in the warranty period.

If you'd like to save some time before ringing HP, try their troubleshooting tip: Hold down the 6 and # (also the 'space' key) keys on the printer's keypad, and turn the printer off. Keep those keys held down, and turn the printer back on. This restores everything to factory defaults and you'll be asked to reselect your language options. Let go of the 6 and # keys and do that. In some cases this has cleared the error, but has never worked for me. A couple of people have also reported that replacing the cartridge does clear the error, but that didn't work for me, and I'm opposed to the idea that you'd have to junk a half-full and otherwise perfectly good (expensive) cart just to satisfy a quirk of a buggy printer.

I've had a look around the web for more information on this error, and there isn't much to go on. There is a suggestion that the internal memory of the printer (and thus the memory which holds information about invalid cartridges) can be reset by removing a battery on the internal chip-board. If my theory about what causes this error is correct, resetting the memory might fix it. I've seen this as a successful 'fix' for other models of HP printer, but can't comment on how effective (or legal) it might be. If you have any experience or feedback on this error or fixes, please leave a comment.

If you're getting this error when sending mail with exim, this will be one of two problems:

The mail-sending server isn't set up to check DNS properly. Check your /etc/resolv.conf file. If it says something like localhost or 127.0.0.1 you're in trouble. This should typically be set to the DNS servers of your hosting provider, but if in doubt set them to those used by OpenDNS:

nameserver 208.67.220.220
nameserver 208.67.222.222

If your nameservers are all working, but you're still getting the error, this probably means there's a problem with the remote host's MX records. To make sure its not just you, go to CheckDNS and put in the domain name you can't send email to. If you see MX record errors, it's them, not you.

A handy quick command to run is:

exim -bt email@address.com

which will test exim's ability to route to the address you specify. For extra debug information add the -d-resolver argument. This will help diagnose which router exim uses to send the email.

It's possible you have an entry for the external domain in your /etc/localdomains file - possibly an old domain you've now hosted elsewhere? If that's the case exim will be trying to route it locally and that's why it's not working. Worse still, if the domain is still configured on the local server you may well find it's getting routed into a local mailbox instead of the target domain, but you wouldn't get an error for that!

If you're running CPanel and desperately want to know why the Mail Troubleshooter (which allows you to trace email addresses for diagnosis) for your desired name is merely saying 'lookuphost via lookuphost', this just relates to the problems above. It's trying to use the lookuphost router (which is fine and correct for an externally-bound email), but its failing to resolve the DNS, so follow the steps above.

Exim is quite vast and difficult to understand - I hope this information helps you troubleshoot your routing issues. I thought I had one tonight when an email with multiple cc:'s could not do DNS lookup for several of the recipients. Naturally I assumed my server was to blame, but an eventual DNSCheck of each found that, surprisingly, it was merely defunct or an 'Error 451: Temporary local problem, please try later' error (which probably means that the domain you're trying to send to is on a shared host which has a working MX relay, but isn't configured to accept email for that particular domain).

Just to update on my previous entry. When I last checked you will recall that the domain whois had changed to an Enom placeholder.

Shortly after this I received another email alert from my script to tell me the domain whois had changed again. It had returned to the 'Domain not found: Code FW-1' which surely indicated something was afoot. Hoping for the name to be dropped, I was dissapointed to find that it eventually changed to the following (modified to omit domain name):

Administrative Contact:
Whois Privacy Protection Service, Inc.
Whois Agent (vrcnpthfc@whoisprivacyprotect.com)
+1.4252740657
Fax: +1.4256960234
PMB 368, 14150 NE 20th St - F1
C/O domainiwanted.com
Bellevue, WA 98007
US

Technical Contact:
Whois Privacy Protection Service, Inc.
Whois Agent (vrcnpthfc@whoisprivacyprotect.com)
+1.4252740657
Fax: +1.4256960234
PMB 368, 14150 NE 20th St - F1
C/O domainiwanted.com
Bellevue, WA 98007
US

Registrant Contact:
Whois Privacy Protection Service, Inc.
Whois Agent ()

Fax:
PMB 368, 14150 NE 20th St - F1
C/O domainiwanted.com
Bellevue, WA 98007
US

Status: Locked

Name Servers:
dns1.name-services.com
dns2.name-services.com
dns3.name-services.com
dns4.name-services.com
dns5.name-services.com

Creation date: 23 Feb 2009 17:25:00
Expiration date: 22 Feb 2010 11:00:00

After some more investigation, I have found that 'Whois Privacy Protection Service, Inc' is the Whois protection service offered by Enom for $6/year.  So if you ever see a whois record like this, it has definitely been registered  through Enom.

So the existance of the record is either a handy pseudonym for some cowardly domainer who snaps up his domains via Enom, or is in fact Enom itself using insider information to snag and slap adverts on prospective domains while wishing to hide the fact they engage in such contemptible practices. I put the probability of it being one of these at 50/50.

So, it looks like my half-desired name is gone, at least for a year. While it might be annoying I still won't explicitly state which domain it was, simply to deprive whomever now owns of it of those few curious hits it would get as a result.

I have used eBay for a very long time, and I've seen the features and interface of the site slowly evolve during that time. As it has become increasingly popular and one of only a couple of major portals on the internet where it's possible to sell items to a large market, the blatant abuse of its position has become apparent even to casual users.

This hit home fiercely for me tonight when I tried to make a listing and found that I could not turn off Paypal as an accepted payment option. Historically you've been able to disable it by unchecking the appropriate box, but that box no longer exists. I searched and hunted for a way to turn it off, and couldn't find one. I searched on Google and eBay's help centre but found nothing except outdated articles that referred me to account options that seemingly no longer exist.

Eventually I realised, as I tried for the 5th time to submit my listing, that the following error was appearing:

To ensure security on the eBay marketplace, it is now mandatory for all listings to offer PayPal as a payment method. Enter a valid email address in order to receive payments.

Let's examine this for a minute. Since eBay acquired Paypal some years ago, it has become forcefully more integrated with eBay's main site. This worked out great for eBay, as they make a fee + percentage for item listings, and then another fee + percentage for accepting payments via Paypal.

Sellers who didn't like this double-profit practice could simply decide not to accept Paypal, and instead demand cheques, or point buyers to one of the now barely seen alternative online payment providers, like Nochex or Bidpay, the latter of which is now defunct.

But consider the gravity of the statement above, eBay now won't let you not accept Paypal. If you list on eBay, buyers have to be able to use Paypal to pay, and since the site is cunningly constructed to funnel you into instantly paying via Paypal, this will mean that a whole load of sellers will unwillingly have an automatic 'transaction fee' cut from their payments, and go straight into eBay's pocket. The guise of doing it for 'security' is just fucking laughable. eBay and Paypal are so exploitable for scammers that it can be a real misery for both legitimate buyers and sellers who meet their scamming counterparts. I could vent a good couple of spleens on an article about the unchecked and well practiced scams that are possible on eBay, but it would just be another cherry on the giant turd pie.

I own lots of domain names, usually because I've had an idea for something one day and registered it on a whim. If I haven't followed through with whatever those ideas were I often let the name drop. If a domain name I want is already taken I shrug my shoulders and move on with my life.

I never really understood the practice of 'Domainers', the people who scan the the daily 'drop list' of expiring domain names in the hopes of finding something 'valuable'. All of the inverted commas for these terms demonstrate my dubious regard for this practice. It's fair to assume that all common names for popular domains were taken long ago, so if something is taken you just pick a unique variation and roll with it.

A name by itself doesn't make something popular. 'YouTube' is one of the most stupid conjuction of words I've ever seen. A lot of others are highly generic words, but in no way are they inherant brand names that'll ensure success of a related product. Even if you owned 'computer.com', would you really think to go there before another PC website?

Well, you wouldn't. 'computer.com' is just a website filled with ads, like so, so many other generic domain names. Since it doesn't come up on any google search for 'computer', you do really wonder what the point of it is. Of course, there will be some ad revenue. Weirdly curiously people will go there and possibly click ads which then generate money for the owners. Despite not being linked from anywhere significant, and not coming up in searches for anything to do with computers, it probably relies entirely on the (probably thousands) of people a day who wonder what is on computer.com.

You're also holding on to the hope that someone, somewhere, will want to buy the name off you. That will never happen either, as your perception of its worth runs into millions of pounds that nobody wants to pay. Not really - why would they? Even if you were a giant, giant computer company, why would you care to have computer.com? It wouldn't add any value to your brand, and it would just be a waste of money.

Kevin Ham has 300,000 domain names and he WANTS YOURS TOO

So these domains sit there, for years and years offering nothing but adverts, clutched by the owners for the trickle of ad revenue and the hope that the 'inherant' value of a generic name will some day be realised by someone stupid enough to part with the money.

But I am digressing heavily.

About a week ago I received an email from a spam-merchant, telling me that a .com variant of a domain that I own the .net and .org's for wasn't being renewed, and that for a fee he would try to obtain it for me.

Let me back up by explaining what happens to a .com domain when you don't renew it. For 30 days after the renewal date, there is a grace period in which the registrant can wake up and pay the fee for the renewal. After those 30 days, it is still possible, for another 30 days, to get the name back but it is slightly harder and usually requires extra fees.

If the registrant is still nowhere to be found, details from the domain's whois record start dissapearing quickly, and 75 days after the renewal date, the domain's status is changed to 'pendingDelete'.

This is where things really start cooking, because 5 calendar days after this, the domain is deleted and becomes publically available once again. Just to clarify what is meant by '5 days', as lots of people seem confused, it is five full days after the domain's status has been updated to 'pendingDelete'. So if the whois record was updated on, say, the 15th of the month, 5 days after this would be the 21st.

The time on that day that it drops is also very important. Names on the droplist start becoming available from 2pm EST (that's 7pm UK), and it takes two hours to work through the list. So it becomes a race of people hammering the whois database for the second that a name becomes fair game.

Lots of individuals are at it, but its very hard to compete with the big three registrars that provide droplist services - Enom, Snapnames, and Pool.com. The trouble with checking the whois record of a domain is that if you do it too often, the IP address of the checking computer will become temporarily banned. This is a problem for the individual, but for large registrars with farms of servers and hundreds of addresses it's a fun monopoly. You simply can't compete.

But then again, they'd only be trying to get the domain in the first place for one of two reasons. One, someone has paid them to try to nab it (where the highest bidder wins), or two, the registrar demonstrates what can only be called utterly fucking bastardry, by registering the domain for themselves and then auctioning it off.

This is fairly common practice. Registrars can nab domains at the point they become available and hold them for 5 days at no charge. During this time they can auction it off or sell it to whoever wants it. After the 5 days, if nobody has bought it, it will drop again and in theory then becomes available to the public. Except for a small loophole, because if a registrar so chooses, they can simply re-acquire it at the point it drops and hold it for another 5 days. This can continue indefinitely to the point where an expired domain is held for months by a speculative registrar (or an individual with the resources to acquire domains at speed and in this fashion) without it ever being fully registered. Because of the zero cost involved, and an apparent unwillingness by ICANN to close the loophole, individuals like you and I are basically fucked if a registrar decides the domain you want might be worth something after all.

Since registrars provide registration services to individuals, you are trapped. There is nothing you can do, and it's tough luck. Your only hope is that the name you want is important to you but irrelevant to everyone else. As I have just discovered, even running searches on the name you want, even if it is not currently available, is enough to tip-off the registrar of its potential worth.

Anyway, back to my story. This guy emails me offering to acquire the .com of this domain name. I don't even respond, because domainers and spammers can get to fucking fuck. While it would be vaguely satisfying and nice to have a 'full set' of TLDs for a particular name, I'm not going to spend a penny above the standard registration price, nor will I be drawn in and convinced I really need something that will have no bearing on my other websites whatsoever.

Mind you, I'll still grab the name if its out there, and so I decide to set up a simple script that, at 2pm EST on the day the domain gets deleted, will whois the database and email me the minute it becomes available, or rather, it will email me when the whois record dissapears. At which point I planned to rush to my registrar (Enom) and get in my registration.

Except it didn't happen that way. At 2pm on the dot the name I wanted was deleted from the database, but instantaneously picked up by someone else. Who could this be? In reality, there are so few people that would want this name to start with that I can't believe someone might have paid an over-the-odds fee to acquire it using a dropping service.

But I don't think this has happened. When I whois the domain now, I get this (name removed):

[Querying whois.internic.net]
[Redirected to whois.enom467.com]
[Querying whois.enom467.com]
[whois.enom467.com]
Domain not found. Code FW-1: DOMAINIWANTED.COM was not found in our system.

Now then, this is very interesting. It means the domain has not been registered by someone else otherwise I'd be looking at their registration data. I tried to find out what 'Code FW-1' means, but I can't find anything explanatory on the web anywhere. Perhaps I'm not looking in the right place.

My best guess is that this is what happens when a registrar procures a name for itself for the aforementioned 5 day period. My suspicion is that Enom have seen my searches for the name on its system over the past few days and decided it might be worth something. As such, I'd never have had a chance of registering it first as Enom would have blocked me and acquired it for themselves before I even got to the checkout.

This is quite cunning, really. In the event I'm not the only one who wants the name, they've now got the opportunity to try and auction it off during the 5 day (or possibly infinite) holding period before they release it again. Based on this highly dishonest business practice, I can only assume that Enom would never sell domain names for the piffiling standard registration fee, and instead would seek to hold all names hostage in an effort to make the most money.

It doesn't surprise me that 'domainers' exist. I consider it fairly cretinous to attempt to acquire something purely for the chance to sell it again at some rip-off price. It's essentially domain-touting and anyone who's ever been to a music gig knows how well regarded touts are. Generally you'd just wish they'd fuck off so you can buy what you want at a fair price. It's the very worst kind of profiteering.

In this vein, I received another email from another spam-worthy fuckbag, informing me that they were going to sell the domain in question in 'approximately 3 days time' and if I wanted to buy it I should register my interest by clicking the following link. It's the height of arrogance to purport to be selling a name that hasn't even expired yet. Clearly they're trying to determine the level of my desperation for this quiet little name ahead of time, despite the fact that I could, in theory, acquire it myself and cut out these fucking middle-men.

So, the domain is in limbo. Nobody has registered it, but nor can I acquire it. Should it sell to someone else I won't be terribly bothered as the other variations of it that I own I don't use heavily anyway. I should point out that I acquired those in the first place as a result of a bored domain search one day. It really isn't a heavily desired name, and I can only assume that Enom are hoping I'm some kind of desperate fanatic who will pay ridiculous price for a name I don't need.

I'm not. Updates on the outcome of this fateful domain will follow

Update:

The domain whois has now updated, to this:

Administrative Contact:
c/o eNom, Inc. on behalf of eNom, Inc. Customer
TBD eNom Customer TBD eNom Customer (legal@enom.com)
+1.4252744500
Fax: +1.4259744795
Correspondence can be sent to:
c/o eNom, Inc. 2002 156th Avenue NE
Bellevue, WA 98007
US

Technical Contact:
c/o eNom, Inc. on behalf of eNom, Inc. Customer
TBD eNom Customer TBD eNom Customer (legal@enom.com)
+1.4252744500
Fax: +1.4259744795
Correspondence can be sent to:
c/o eNom, Inc. 2002 156th Avenue NE
Bellevue, WA 98007
US

Registrant Contact:
c/o eNom, Inc. on behalf of eNom, Inc. Customer
TBD eNom Customer TBD eNom Customer ()

Fax:
Correspondence can be sent to:
c/o eNom, Inc. 2002 156th Avenue NE
Bellevue, WA 98007
US

Status: Active

Name Servers:
dns1.name-services.com
dns2.name-services.com
dns3.name-services.com
dns4.name-services.com
dns5.name-services.com

So, it appears the domain has been acquired on behalf of a customer. This may mean that someone has indeed used the name dropping service to pay a price over the odds for the name, or that this is just what Enom does when it's setting up a domain to be auctioned off. I'll only know if the name is updated with a Real Person's name, or when this pops up in an Afternic auction.