Category Archives: Computers

RubyQuest

Ruby with Junkzooka

Ruby is a rabbit. She is trapped, and confronted with a series of puzzle-like challenges. Back in December, somebody calling himself “Weaver” started up a choose-your-own-adventure thread on 4chan‘s /tg/ board wherein the imageboard participants could suggest the little rabbit’s course of inquiry and action.

The first wave of puzzle challenges are resolved much as you would expect from a typical “you are stuck in a closet” point-and-click flash puzzle, but as it progresses we are exposed to the horrible imagination of Weaver, and Ruby is subjected to increasingly creepy or even horrifying situations. As one participant remarked: “Shit just got DOUBLE LOVECRAFTIAN.” By the time the second session of the Ruby story is under way, there is a seriously paranoid air to things, as shown to us through a rolling archive of message-board posts, with anonymous participants shouting each other down in exaggerated panic as to which button should be pushed next, which items should be examined in what order, and whether or not Ruby’s feminine physique is up to a particular task.

If you ever played games like Survival in New York City or the old Manhunter game by Sierra, I cannot recommend this game strongly enough. Go though the archives and agonize over the stupidity of the other players, revel in their genius, and be horribly horribly frustrated by the recommendations Weaver goes with. Also recommended if you like zombies, rabbits, or very crudely-drawn puzzles.

Mass Mailing

One of the plagues of the Internets, one of those sterling examples of a technology victimized by its own success, is unsolicited bulk email. It is obnoxious. It is a hassle for recipients and system administrators. It is a pain to identify in an automated manner, spawning an entire sub-industry of professionals dedicated to thwarting it. Frankly it’s a theft of service. It’s also fairly easy to get involved in accidentally.

For people that have been using the Internets since before they were re-pluralized, the notion of just adding a big batch of total strangers to your mailing list wouldn’t even come up. Who’d do that? It’s terrible etiquette. Sadly Miss Manners hasn’t quite spread the word. Happily, the folks at MailChimp have an excellent listing of representative scenarios to help illuminate the unwashed masses that are looking to do some legitimate mailing:

“I bought a list of 30 million emails from this guy on the Internet, and…”

Stop right there. Don’t use MailChimp. Don’t use anything. Throw away the list. Turn off the computer. Snip the power cord, so this doesn’t happen again. Now go punch yourself in the gut.

It’s an entertaining read, especially if you already know better.

iPhone settings for Sonic.net

This seems to come up a lot, though Sonic.net does not officially support the iPhone interface and therefore has no public documentation on the subject. To get an Apple iPhone to use email properly, using IMAP, for a Sonic.net email account, follow these steps:

Sonic.net Settings Summary

  1. If this is your first mail setup, start by tapping Mail
  2. Otherwise tap Settings
  3. Tap Mail, Contacts, Calendars
  4. Under Accounts, tap Add Account…
  5. Tap Other
  6. In the New Account window tap Name and type in your Full Name
  7. Tap the Address field and type in your Sonic.net (or domain) email address
  8. Tap the Password field and type in your Sonic.net password
  9. Tap the Description field to change the description name if you wish. (Optional)
  10. Tap the Save button
  11. Tap IMAP
  12. Under Incoming Mail Server, tap the Host Name field and type in imap.sonic.net
  13. Tap the User Name field and type in your Sonic.net username
  14. The password should be filled in for you from the previous screen
  15. Touch and scroll to the Outgoing Mail Server section
  16. Tap the Host Name field and type in mail.sonic.net
  17. Tap the User Name field and type in your Sonic.net username
  18. Tap the Password field and type in your Sonic.net password
  19. Tap the Save button at the top of the screen
  20. Mail will verify your settings by connecting to the server

To confirm your settings are correct:

  1. Tap Settings on your home screen.
  2. Tap the name of the account you want to check the settings for. A settings summary should appear.
    • The Host Name is your incoming mail server, imap.sonic.net
    • The User Name is the Sonic.net account name of the mailbox you’re using
    • The Password field should contain a series of dots
  3. For your outgoing mail server, the SMTP should be mail.sonic.net. Tap this to view more information about your outgoing mail server.
    • Tap mail.sonic.net to see its settings
    • Server should be ON
    • Host Name is mail.sonic.net
    • User name is the Sonic.net account name of the mailbox you’re using
    • The Password field should contain a series of dots
    • As you are likely to communicate on your iPhone on a variety of networks, Use SSL should be ON
    • Tap Authentication for authentication settings
    • Password should be checked in the Authentication screen
    • Server Port is typically 25. Many networks block port 25 access to anything but their own mail servers, so it may be a good idea to specify an alternate port. This can be accomplished by replacing mail.sonic.net with mail.sonic.net:587 in the Host Name field.
  4. Tap Advanced for additional settings

This is in no way an endorsement of Apple, the iPhone, nor IMAP.