Technology Any other Computer nerds here?

[JadeStorm]

That's right I'm a computer nerd, and I am wondering if we have any other members who also are interested in computers/smart phones/IoT devices. A bit about me I work in the technology industry I do some networking aswell as coding mainly in /vbs/vba/python/perl/c/asm (bash and powershell go without question) and of course more common web languages such as html/javascript/php/sql. I did do some Java programming a long time ago, but now the only real place I see Java is in corporate networks for their "thicknet" apps. I also work pretty much everyday on Windows and Linux and have been at it since 1999, hence why powershell, wscript, cscript and bash are my bread and butter . I mainly deal with security or the lack thereof also a bit of malware reversing and analysis developing IOC's (indicators of compromise)mainly when I am dealing with incident response, I am very comfortable with memory forensics, network forensics, recovery of artifacts from a disk image, memory dumps, and network traffic captures. I have done forensics on Windows, and Linux no OSX yet, but not due to their amazing security.

So I right now am working on improving my reversing skills so it's a lot of c and asm in my day to day learning, work offered to pay for a course on reverse engineering so I am taking the next couple of months to focus on self prep as to excel. The following is the course which I will be taking.

https://www.elearnsecurity.com/course/advanced_reverse_engineering_of_software/

Perhaps others may deal with other things web development, application development, building computers, graphic design, audio mixing anything really it's all welcomed. I look forward to anyone who wants to share.

 

[Tha_Wood]

Shit man, me reading that was like reading some alien language. I used to fuck around with computers and shit when I was like 12-14 years old but I've forgotten all of it and was pretty basic. Changed a graphics card once lol

 

[JadeStorm]

Shit man, me reading that was like reading some alien language. I used to fuck around with computers and shit when I was like 12-14 years old but I've forgotten all of it and was pretty basic. Changed a graphics card once lol

Yes after a while it does get overwhelming I actually took about a two week vacation I was so burned out from work. My day consisted of 2 hours everyday after work on my own time at home just keeping up so I can improve my skillsets, maybe testing stuff or ideas I had.

 

[masta247]

I am. I can work with code but I am not a programmer. Still, as a student, I worked at IBM's fancy-pants software group on their BI and Data Mining software, then I realized that at work I actually prefer human interaction and problems, plus the concept of picking a single field to commit myself to for years to come wouldn't sound good to me, and that's how I initially became a project manager. I completed my masters in both, at work I left the front lines, later took over some less geeky projects and now computers are more of a hobby.

I'm one of those guys who would get burned out solving coding problems on a daily basis, but I wholeheartedly enjoy working with people who love it. Still, I need to know the tech I work with inside-out, but I would much rather leave the nitty-gritty to the people who actually enjoy messing with it for 8 hours every single day, and instead of being a single gear of the machine, I like seeing the whole machine move in the right direction.

As a hobby, I like hardware design. It started after finding out about the SemiAccurate forums. Now it's everything from the processors through mobile phone components to display tech and a lot of stuff in between (while a random and rather simple example, at my previous apartment I built a custom refrigerator due to frustrations with the breaking frost-free units we had). As a teenager, I would make extra cash by building computers, then by making apps, then by fixing peoples' horrible managerial decisions in tech companies, which pretty much illustrates my path, and now I can also work with a much wider range of technology sectors, which I really like. There's not much that bothers me more than horrible management moving great engineering work down the drain, so I'm passionate about preventing that from happening.

 

[JadeStorm]

I am. I can work with code but I am not a programmer. Still, as a student, I worked at IBM's fancy-pants software group on their BI and Data Mining software, then I realized that at work I actually prefer human interaction and problems, and that's how I initially became a project manager. I completed my masters in both,
then at work I left the front lines, later took over some less geeky projects and now computers are more of a hobby. I'm one of those guys who would get burned out solving coding problems on a daily basis, but I wholeheartedly enjoy working with people who love it. Still, I need to know the tech I work with inside-out, but I would much rather leave the nitty-gritty to the people who actually enjoy messing with it for 8 hours every single day.

As a hobby, I like hardware design. It started after finding out about the SemiAccurate forums. Now it's everything from the processors through mobile phone components to display tech and a lot of stuff in between. As a teenager, I would make extra cash by building computers, then by making apps, then by fixing peoples' horrible managerial decisions in tech companies, which pretty much illustrates my path, and also allows me to work with a much wider range of technology sectors, which I really like. There's not much I'm more passionate about than horrible management moving great engineering work down the drain.

That is awesome I rarely see a manager who actually understand what the average worker bee is dealing with. When you talk about hardware design like do you make your own boards and draw them up on CAD and print them up? That is pretty awesome I do a bit of Arduino programming and soldering that's about it in that arena, and mainly when I built my own widucky, and a lan tap which looks like a phone wall mount of course with our own device. At work one of the guys developed a small remote rfid reader, works great although a handful of stuff usually works, but still it's a good tool in the bag.

Let me ask what do you suggest one learns to be able to design their own boards and devices?

 

[masta247]

That is awesome I rarely see a manager who actually understand what the average worker bee is dealing with. When you talk about hardware design like do you make your own boards and draw them up on CAD and print them up? That is pretty awesome I do a bit of Arduino programming and soldering that's about it in that arena, and mainly when I built my own widucky, and a lan tap which looks like a phone wall mount of course with our own device. At work one of the guys developed a small remote rfid reader, works great although a handful of stuff usually works, but still it's a good tool in the bag.

Let me ask what do you suggest one learns to be able to design their own boards and devices?

I didn't get to make my own boards. By hardware design, I meant hardware design models, or architectures, but more theoretical rather than putting that knowledge into practice. I like being up to date with how the newest tech works. For instance, if a new processor architecture comes out, I like understanding the improvements that went into making it better, why it was made the way it was, and where is the room for improvements for future products to see where we might go from here. If a new display tech comes out, I like understanding exactly how it works and what problems led to its shortcomings. When I need to buy any piece of electronics that I'm not yet "familiar" with, I usually spend weeks researching everything I can find about it before buying the "perfect" (or least imperfect) product, and then I tinker with it. I guess all of the above just really interests me. I like having the overview of the current tech, the progress, and understanding of how things might improve so I have the next big thing that will solve new problems in new ways to hope for.

Making my own boards for sure would require stepping up my game in actual applied electronic circuit design and getting some serious electrical engineering education. Case in point - making a fridge while using a pre-made control board is much easier than building that board itself alone in the first place. I know how it works and what it does, but I always thought that it's a whole different effort to actually make one.

 

[JadeStorm]

I didn't get to make my own boards. By hardware design, I meant hardware design models, or architectures, but more theoretical rather than putting that knowledge into practice. I like being up to date with how the newest tech works. For instance, if a new processor architecture comes out, I like understanding the improvements that went into making it better. Making my own boards for sure would require stepping up my game in actual applied electronic circuit design and getting some serious electrical engineering education. Case in point - making a fridge while using a pre-made control board is much easier than building that board itself alone in the first place. I know how it works and what it does, but I always thought that it's a whole different effort to actually make one.

Yeah it's definitely a ton more work to build your own boards, I remember years ago there was an engine ECU called MegaSquirt basically it comes in pieces took two of us to get it all put together, just soldering really. But yeah I remember as a kid getting a radio which you put together, it definitely requires some knowledge to go from an idea to a CAD drawing then to production. Like the guys who made MegaSquirt I can't imagine how many hours they spent just making everything, we put this thing together back in 2003 or something, when technology was not as wide spread or prohibitively expensive.

 

[Jokerman]

Shit man, me reading that was like reading some alien language. I used to fuck around with computers and shit when I was like 12-14 years old but I've forgotten all of it and was pretty basic. Changed a graphics card once lol

Me reading this was like reading some alien language. A language that evidently speaks directly to the subconscious. I could feel the hypnotic pull of it. You are a clever one, indeed.