GeekwithEnvy

internet

Keep NASA Strong Sign a Petition

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NASAmeatball

Help keep NASA going strong by helping them keep their budget from dropping below 1% of Federal Funding. There are many things that make the United States successful and advancing our knowledge and ability, which NASA greatly contributes to, is clearly one program worth keeping strong.

So, if you feel the same, then let’s take action and let the government know how we feel by signing a petition.

In 1961, at the height of the space race, the NASA budget was 4.41% of federal outlays. In 2005, despite the federal government spending only ~$15 billion on NASA.

The 2013 budget expects ~$19 billion of funding for NASA or half of a percent of spending; truly this is a pittance, but one that yields vast economic and scientific rewards.

NASA advances our nation when well-funded; by guaranteeing that no less than 1% of federal spending will be on NASA, we promote job creation, encourage creativity in the economy, and gain insight on our universe.

1% is a small financial guarantee of progress in the final frontier!

A Quick Guide to IPv6

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In order to better understand what IPv6 is and why it’s important to the internet’s future, we should briefly discuss what Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) is and what the main problem with it is.ipv6Illustration

IPv4 addresses are comprised of a 32-bit value. This system is what the majority of the internet has been using for Internet Protocol (IP). A standard IPv4 address looks like this:

(192.x.x.xxx)

This 32-bit integer system allows for a possible combination of up to 4,294,967,296 (232) addresses. Yes, that’s a lot of addresses but we have run out of them, in fact we ran out of them in early 2011. Keep in mind that there are over 20 billion active devices connected to the internet.

The Problem:

Every single device that connects to the internet is assigned an IP address. As we mentioned earlier, there are billions of devices out there and that number keeps getting higher every day. The internet needs to be able to keep up with that incredible pace, but it can’t. IPv4 has already run out of addresses and all we can do with IPv4 addresses now is reclaim them and re-assign them.

The solution

Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is the next step forward in internet address assignment. IPv6 uses a 128-bit address system and that means a possible combination of up to 3.4×1038 addresses, yes, that’s 340 trillion trillion trillion! Clearly this is the format we wan’t to be using in a world that’s constantly adding more and more devices to the internet.

A common address for IPv6 is formatted like this:

(2001:0db8:85a3:0042:1000:8a2e:0370:7334).

What are some other benefits that IPv6 has?

IPv6 is far more efficient when it comes to sending data and it even offers up auto configuration capabilities that don’t exist with IPv4. The new protocol is also much more secure and offers true end-to-end connectivity, which eliminates the need for Network Address Translation (NAT). NAT helped reduce problems with the IPv4 model as it began to run out of addresses by allowing you to hide multiple private IP addresses behind one IP address. Without it, we would have had a lot more trouble with IPv4 in the past.

So when do we switch and how long will it take?

Well the transition to IPv6 is going to take quite a while but it has already begun. The world IPv6 Launch occurred on June 6, 2012 and we continue to make progress as internet providers and websites make the change.

Am I on IPv6 Already?

Chances are that you aren’t but if you want to be sure, Google can help you figure that out by heading here.

 

 

See into the Internet Past With The Internet Archive

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The internet has come a long way over the years and that’s never more obvious then when you go back in time and look at what websites used to look like compared to today. So, how can we go back in time? We can with the Internet Archive Wayback Machine.

Microsoft Old Website

 

This archive features over 240 billion web pages that date as far back as 1996. All you have to do to get started is head to the link above and then enter in a URL. The site will likely serve up the page you’ve requested along with a timeline at the top of the page. The timeline will indicate the number of captures for that particular URL and how far back you will be able to go.

Yahoo 1996

 

If you’re interested in the hardware behind all of this then you can head here for more information.

How To Understand and Test Your Internet Speed

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Your internet provider says you should be getting a specific speed for the price you’re paying, but are you really getting those speeds? There are many useful sites that you can go to to test your speeds but it’s important to remember that all speeds can vary from test to test.

Speed of internet connection

Varying Speeds

Let’s say that your internet provider is supposed to be supplying you a 12 Mbps connection on your downstream. At times that may test at 10 Mbps or 9400 Mbps. It’s important to note that these fluctuations are usually of no major concern and are a product of “normal” changes in your bandwidth. However, if you find (in our hypothetical situation) that you’re only getting 4 or 5 Mbps, something has likely gone wrong and you should contact your internet provider.

Bits VS Bytes

Don’t be confused by the data rates being advertised by your service provider. All to often do I run into people who are confused about the download rates they are seeing when downloading a specific file. Here is the easiest way to show the difference between 1Mbps and 1 MB/s.

1 Mbps is equal (=) to 0.125 MB/s

Remember this when your looking at the data rate for a given download, the speeds you’re seeing will make much more sense.

Bottlenecks

Remember that just because your connection to the internet is fast doesn’t mean that what your connecting to is. Many servers will only offer a certain amount of bandwidth for you to use when obtaining data from them. This is because the people who set up these servers want to reduce the overall load on their system. One way to get around this issue is to offer content through a torrent, this will allow for much higher data rates with minimal impact to server load. Torrents will be discussed in another article.

Websites to test your speed:

Here are a few websites that I have found to be the best when it comes to testing your bandwidth.

Google Goes Down For A While

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Some people went into a state of shock today as many of Google’s services including Gmail, Drive and just about everything else went down. All of this happened early in the afternoon today and as of 9 PM PST there doesn’t appear to be any official word on exactly what happened earlier today. Google did however post information stating the they were aware of the issue and working quickly to get it resolved.

Gmail Logo
Gmail Logo (Source:Google)

Google has gone down in the past but this was a pretty good punch. Social media sites like Twitter were blowing up with tweets about the outage and it felt kind of like the internet had disappeared.

It’s a strange feeling when things “mess up” on the internet that aren’t supposed to. Not to long ago Godaddy.com went down and so did many of the websites that depend on Godaddy to operate. Server errors were handed out to millions upon millions of users and it seemed that for a short moment the world had suddenly come to an abrupt stop.

Our dependency on the internet is substantial and when it’s not functioning, neither are we. It’s kind of a scary thought and it’s a thought I have discussed before, we really need to continue to improve the reliability of the internet and continue to improve web-security. Even though Google was able to quickly resolve most issues, it still shows a giant vulnerability in our system.

When a team of divers enter underwater caves, often referred to as “blue holes”, they tie a rope to rocks as they go deeper into the cave. This rope leads back to the entrance of the underwater cave and acts as a life line for these underwater explorers. Our modern world relies so heavily on the internet and our safety line is getting thinner and thinner as many of us move away form doing things offline. Many companies, including banks and utilities have encouraged us to go to paperless statements only to find that when their site goes down, your essentially helpless. If the service goes down for hours or in some cases days, it can be difficult to get through busy phone lines to make sure issues get resolved.

Now imagine loosing it all and things begin to get very serious. I laugh as I begin to recall a particular South Park episode in which the internet goes down. Google seems to be back on it’s feet and as soon as we see an official explanation we will let you know.